When and Why IICRC Creates New Standards in Restoration

It’s not something that happens often — and for good reason. Creating a new standard is a massive undertaking. It takes years, it involves a lot of people, and once it starts, there’s no turning back.

A new standard usually comes about when there’s a clear and ongoing gap in the industry — a part of the job where folks are looking around for guidance and realizing, “There’s nothing written down for this.”

That’s exactly what happened with areas like trauma and crime scene cleanup or fire and smoke damage restoration. The industry kept running into these situations without a solid reference point. Over time, it became clear that something official needed to exist.

It’s not like someone just decides over the weekend that IICRC should write a new standard. The organization hears about the gap repeatedly, from multiple sources, and once it reaches a tipping point, they’ll say, “Okay — it’s time.”

But if there’s already a solid standard out there from another organization, they won’t reinvent the wheel. They’ll reference it instead. Harmonizing across the industry is important — it keeps things consistent and avoids unnecessary overlap.